An Error in Compromise
by Virtue
Summary: Goku's homecomings are anything but smooth.
1. Chapter 1

**An Error in Compromise**

* * *

With all the gentleness he could muster, Goku pushed on the bedroom door with the side of his knuckle, filling the dark room previously lit only by the glowing stars of the mock solar system over his son's bed.

The light from the hall washed over Gohan and Chi Chi. The former lay star-fished under his covers, sleeping restfully and blissfully unaware of his mother's presence hovering over him, the collar of her robe draping loosely over her shoulder and her hair in haphazard tendrils from a lazy bun; she was uncharacteristically messy as she'd rushed from the shower to check on him as he slept, as if the absence of her presence would make him disappear.

He'd forgotten about the toothbrush in his mouth, because when he started brushing his teeth in their bathroom it occurred to him that he hadn't seen Chi Chi in a while, and wandered the house until he found her on her knees on the floor of their son's bedroom.

The light of the hallway disturbed her, and her expression met his. "It's late, isn't it." It sounded like it should be a question, but with the tone of her voice it sounded more like a statement.

He hummed, contemplatively in response. He was to tell her it was no big deal, and that he was just wondering where she went, but she smiled gently back at him and he froze, swallowing the excess toothpaste that slid to the back of his throat.

"I'll be there in a minute, okay?" Chi Chi mistook his silence for validity of her previous statement. "I just..." She glanced back at the sleeping child. "I want to be with him a while longer."

Goku smiled slightly and nodded, closing the door slowly again, failing to mask the usual creaking noise it made as the hinge moved in the joint. Chi Chi's explosive response to his return earlier that day had worn her down, and no doubt she'd already been worn thin by his absence and the near-death situation their son recently had on Namek.

He resumed his brushing and headed back down the hall to their own bedroom. It was nice to be home again, where the grandfather clock ticked audibly in the hall where his socks met the carpet and Chi Chi's smell was everywhere.

He much preferred to bathe outdoors. Their shower was such a small, enclosed space filled with easily breakable objects that he hardly felt comfortable. But he hadn't been under the stream of water for a minute when Chi Chi entered the bathroom.

"I missed you both so much."

It wasn't the first time he'd heard her say that that day, when her anger melted to sorrow the way it usually did.

"I can't speak for Gohan," Goku smiled as he worked shampoo through his hair, "But I can say I missed you too, Chi Chi."

"Yeah, right." Came her sharp reply.

She'd carried some contempt with her from the circumstances of his departure and his return. He left suddenly when he'd heard his assistance on Namek was needed, and the next time he saw her he was begging her to let Gohan train with him to fight the Androids when the time came. It was all with his best intentions, but with little regard for her feelings.

It was a little bit selfish, he only weakly admitted to himself. Bulma's suggestion to nip the entire situation in the bud had fallen short against his desire for a strong opponent. But he'd never dare to tell Chi Chi that.

Goku glanced over the top of the shower curtain to see what she was doing. She stood with a foot on the open toilet seat, carefully snipping at her toenails with her back towards him.

"But I _did._ " He insisted, letting the water run over his hair and unable to hide the smile in his voice.

" _Prove_ it." She dared back. The tenderness of her mood from watching Gohan was wearing off, leaving the sturdy temperament she almost exclusively held for him.

"Okay, I'll be out in a second so hold on." It wasn't really his intent to seduce her, but he liked to tease her about it when she was being stubborn. Although admittedly, when she got worked up over things it made him want to seduce her.

"That's not what I meant!" She shot him a hard look over her bare shoulder and he looked back down at the floor of the tub, pretending not to notice.

"I meant that I want you to actually _act_ like you want this life, Goku."

He paused. "Like right now? _This_ life?"

He didn't see her eyes roll, but he knew that was what she was doing by the inflection of her voice. "Yeah, I mean _this_ one."

He dwelled on the thought for a moment before shutting the water off.

"Pass me a towel?"

He heard the bathroom cupboard open and close and her hand shot through the crack between the shower curtain and the tiled wall. He accepted it, wordlessly watching her eye herself in the mirror. She was undoubtedly berating herself for an unkempt appearance she'd been oblivious of all evening.

He dried himself off and opened the shower curtain, causing loose steam to flow over her: to the surface of her skin and the openings of her nostrils, and tiny droplets on the tips of her long, dark eyelashes.

It had been the longest he'd gone without her since before they were engaged, and though she didn't believe it, the truth was that he did miss her terribly. Because in the world outside he ached for a fight- his DNA demanded it. But Chi Chi's presence was like a steady white noise, drowning out the distractions in his mind of the outside world, holding his focus with her own. However, that wasn't always necessarily a pleasant thing.

He'd learned a bit more than he'd liked to about his heritage on Namek. He'd once dismissed his biological parents as insignificant factors due to the existence of his grandpa, but Frieza had told him how he faced his father who _looked_ like him had a will to destroy him just like Goku did, however different their reasoning might've been.

It made him wonder briefly if he'd been loved the way that he and Chi Chi loved Gohan, but he'd been loved so much by his Grandpa he supposed it didn't matter in the end.

His mind strayed to Trunks, still blown that Bulma and Vegeta would be parents. He was in full anticipation on how _that_ would pan out.

"What're you thinking about?" Chi Chi questioned him. She was in the bedroom now, disrobing at the corner of his eye and pulling a nightgown from the hook on the back of the door and only her shoulders in a graceful motion.

"Nothing, really."

She eyed him suspiciously, walking to the bed and pulling the covers back.

"That stupid look on your face didn't seem like nothing."

Goku chuckled. Chi Chi called things like she saw them. His minimal experience with people taught him that not everyone was that way.

"Hey, I'll tell you about it soon, okay?" He pulled on the boxers and sweatpants that were on the bathroom floor.

The sincerity in his voice must've been noted, because her countenance became a bit more gentle.

"Alright."

Goku walked to his own side of the bed and pulled back the bedspread, exposing her body to be chilled by the cool bedroom air.

"Give me the blanket back!"

He laughed playfully, still withholding her covers from her.

"Alright, but can I cuddle with my wife tonight?"

" _No._ If you really wanted to cuddle you should've thought of that before you dropped that bomb on me today." Chi Chi hissed, and brought her arms protectively to her chest to ward off the goosebumps poking through her skin. " _Stop_ teasing me."

His eyebrows raised in feigned innocence. _"I wouldn't."_

And just like that, he tossed the blanket back to her and curled himself around her before she could protest. His knees bent under hers and the top of her head slid just under the reach of his nose. Chi Chi always smelled good, but he liked it the best when she was like this. Her hair was still damp and smelled like the herbal shampoo she used.

They lay like that in the stillness for a while, and her steady pulses under his told him that she wasn't quite tired yet, though the buzz she'd set across his mind was kicking in and sleep was creeping through his brain: the peaceful and deep kind. The kind he only had when he was with her.

"Do you think Gohan will be alright?"

Goku snapped to attention, his eyes still heavy with sleep. He pulled her tighter. "Yeah, Chi Chi, he seems like he's okay." He replied sleepily.

"No. That's not what I mean." Chi Chi squirmed against him, forcing him to loosen his hold on her so that she could stare intently at him from across the pillow.

"What do you mean?" Goku yawned.

"I mean, do you think he should talk to someone? They say kids can carry trauma around for years and no one will notice because they compartmentalize-"

"-Let's talk to Gohan in the morning and see. He can tell us." Goku cut in lazily.

"I know." She bit her lip. "I've just been so worried about him this whole time. I don't know how to stop. Or how to make my brain be quiet."

Goku propped his head on by his elbow. She tossed onto her back with a hand above her head and the other on her stomach. Her brow furrowed as she released what was left of her bun and her hair spilled over the pillow, the damp scent of her herbal shampoo spilling with it.

"Gohan's not your average kid, Chi Chi. He's incredibly strong. I've seen it. I wouldn't ask you to let him train if I wasn't sure he could handle it."

"I know." She repeated, though this time her voice lifted at the end like the kind of voice she made when she was fending off tears. She turned toward him, sliding her palms under the pillow.

"Sometimes I feel like all I do is worry and cry." She bit her lip and breathed deeply. "And I don't even know if it's normal because I don't even remember what my own mother was like."

Goku was fully awake now, and reached to run a hand over her shoulder and down the length to her elbows, absentmindedly admiring the small hills of muscle beneath her skin.

"I'm no help there either." He replied gently.

"Sometimes I... I want to have another one, you know? But I can't imagine loving anyone as much as I love Gohan." Chi Chi mused darkly.

"Another baby?" Goku pondered, "Where would we put another one?"

Chi Chi chuckled and smacked his chest playfully. " _That's_ what you're worried about?"

"Well it's the first thing to come to mind, yeah." Goku smiled back, realizing how silly his words sounded now.

"Well for the first several months we'd keep the baby in here with us, like we did with Gohan, and then after that we have Gohan's room."

"What if it's a girl? Gohan won't be able to change in his own room if there's a girl there, will he?"

Chi Chi's smirk remained. "Then I guess we'd add another room so that Gohan can be as _carefree_ in the nude as his father, since that's clearly the priority here."

He smiled back. "That sounds nice."

"I think so too," Chi Chi agreed, but then her joyful features fell, casting sad shadows on her face in the darkness of the room. "But sometimes I think of all the awful things that can happen to us, I picture the blood and the smells and the carnage and I-"

"Shhh." He whispered, putting a finger to her lips. He'd never dare to do that in the light of day.

"You can't let that be the only reason we don't try."

Her eyes widened. "You mean you'd want to?"

He shrugged. "Well I love Gohan. He was so cute as a baby, wasn't he?"

Chi Chi's expression lightened as he reached to pushed her fingers through his hair, which was something he loved and it caused him to slide his eyes shut and let his hand that once rested on her elbow to fall to the curve of her hip. He liked that spot- during his time spent about the universe he'd think about it when his mind needed a temporary rest from the desperation at hand, and thinking about his hand on that spot eased his mind with thoughts of pleasure.

"Gohan was an easy baby. They're usually much harder."

"Maybe we'll only make 'easy babies'?" Whatever that meant.

Chi Chi snorted. "I doubt that."

He felt heat emanate from his body now, not because he necessarily _wanted_ a baby in this instant, but because Chi Chi had made him think about lovemaking, and his hand was on the part of her hip that he liked a lot while her fingers were in his hair, and he was lying down with her for the first time in a long time, and he was longing for her.

It was his favorite thing, maybe more than fighting, because they'd had one another figured out, and making love with Chi Chi was the most primal thing he'd ever done, as even fighting required some level of critical thinking. Sometimes. And it filled him only with the desire of pleasing her. Sometimes she was too competitive for her own good- and those nights could take forever.

" _Goku_." Chi Chi gasped when he slowly pressed his lips against hers and stifled her weak reluctance, and her hands pushed against his chest halfheartedly before working their way up to the back of his neck, pulling him back down against her and he dropped against her clumsily. Her nightgown rode up her thighs as her knees parted and her back arched against him in familiar expectancy.

It occurred to him somewhere in the back of his mind that it was possible Chi Chi thought he was trying to make a baby while she was still unsure, but the fact of the matter was that he simply missed her, and this was the only thing that made their minds be quiet.

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A/N: Apologies for any inconsistencies with the storyline, it has been a while! Thanks for reading!


	2. Chapter 2

"Didn't you know?"

Chi Chi raised a brow, pulling the covers closer to her chest. She didn't know what he was talking about, not at all.

"No." She replied curtly, offering him a reluctant smile. Goku's return was so sudden and abrupt after she'd managed raising his sons alone. Life was hard, but she'd grown accustomed to that, digging in her heels as stubbornly as she could, consenting only to the things that brought her peace and joy, and starkly refusing the things that didn't.

She'd sworn Goku off long ago, some time in between her fourth pregnancy test in a row turned pink and when Bulma threw her a baby shower in her own home, when what _should've_ been a happy afternoon was interrupted by Gohan's shenanigans with Goku's friends resulting in the destruction of property. _Her_ property.

So when Goku returned she didn't react the way she did in her fantasies: cold, offering him a middle finger and a ' _no thanks.'_

She reacted the way that make her feel weak; because when she saw his face her knees trembled and when his voice spoke her name declaring _"I missed you, Chi Chi."_ She knew it was sincere and it made her giddy for all the moments she'd missed over the last several years.

And to top it off, Goku hardly returned with grace. Brilliant lights in the backyard where their friends had gathered warranted her suspicion that something was up, and when she dared to open the door there Goku stood, stark naked in all his glory, as Goten and Trunks hopped around him, with an entire lineup of people to watch the unabashed display without censorship- that included Videl, Gohan's new flame who hardly needed any more reasons to be weirded out by this family.

This was bad.

At least it would be, in any other circumstance that didn't involve Goku's recent return from the dead. Chi Chi stayed in the kitchen long after she needed to, putting off the expectation of going to bed with her husband, because for so many years he'd been absent, and now here he was, with his arms crossed in her kitchen as if he'd never left in the first place.

He'd never died on her. He'd never died and refused to come back.

"I thought you _knew._ " Goku's brow furrowed in the dark, his arm catching around her waist in the midst of the impulse she had to pull away from him.

They were completely bare, because as soon as she'd entered the bedroom with him she could hardly make small talk anymore, but she could hardly be angry at him for the show he'd put on for their friends- who in that group hadn't already seen him naked other than Videl anyway?

It was only a matter of time, Chi Chi told herself.

"You never _told_ me." Chi Chi couldn't help but hiss. The aftermath of their lovemaking left her with clarity and the bitterness that went along with being a widow of a man who made her that way voluntarily.

Their bedroom door wasn't locked, Chi Chi realized, and she felt the instant anxiety about it being that way, because Goten was accustomed to opening it at his own free will. As a single parent Chi Chi never enforced the strict measures of privacy that she had with Gohan in his younger years. If anything, she welcomed the rude interruptions that her younger son offered her at dawn or in the dead of night when he felt uneasy even in his older's brother's presence. Goten was like the softness of a summer breeze in the dead of winter, and Chi Chi never dared to discourage that if she didn't have to.

Her hair was loose, so when Goku's fingers threaded through it, eyes locking on hers for concern she forgot about the unlocked door, but only for a moment.

"I guess I just assumed you would would know anyway," He told her earnestly, though Chi Chi had known it in the depths of her consciousness the entire time he'd been gone, he'd never explained it to her, never bothered to share it with her, and for that she felt spite towards him.

He looked at her with an intent that made her feel resentment and heartbreak, because she knew his reasoning would be sound and that he loved her, at least enough to snake an arm around her waist, pulling her against him again.

"Oh _man,_ I really carried this out in the worst possible way, didn't I." Goku lamented, turning onto his back without relinquishing his hold on her.

Chi Chi felt guilty in that moment. Guilty, because she hadn't let on how well she understood him despite the fact that he'd surprised her to say the least, and though that didn't give her any reprieve from her anger towards him she did understand.

It's just that sometimes, she wanted to be selfish.

She wanted Goku to be there when she'd gone to the doctor about Goten's first ultrasound, and she wanted him to be there for his birth. She wanted him to be there on the morning of Gohan's first day in high school to wish him well.

But a man who did those things could carry the same burdens he did, she knew. Still, it hurt.

She wanted him to feel the pain of his absence like she did.

"No." Chi Chi sighed, turning towards him, biting her own lip subtly. The wall-mounted bookcase across the bed hung by a single nail now, with the books it held having slid to the floor. In the moment neither of them cared to pay it any attention, but in the light of realization Chi Chi saw the destruction for what it is, yet another mess to fuss about in the morning.

"But I doubt there's anything in the rulebook about, you know, spouses who have to sacrifice themselves to save the world." She ran a thumb over his chin, the skin was soft and hard at the same time, and he seemed to understand the tenderness for what it was and turned toward her.

"You've been reading the rulebook?" He replied cheekily, grasping her hand in his as she snuggled closer.

"I have," Chi Chi nodded. How was it, that Goku could look at her like this and her every inhibition went away? "And I have to say, it never once told me what you were thinking, and it never prepared me for having a second kid without you here."

Goku winced, "I swear I didn't know."

"Me neither. It's alright now. He turned out okay didn't he?"

"Okay?" Goku inhaled sharply, "Didn't you see him compete in the tournament? He's _so_ strong and so handsome too."

Chi Chi's lips curled against him. She'd already known those things about Goten, but hearing Goku say then only made her feelings for her youngest flutter like butterflies in her stomach.

"And funny," Goku mused, "You should've heard the things he was telling me today."

Truly, there was nothing she wouldn't do for her children.

"I didn't return because I wanted to give you some peace." Goku told her softly, tilting her chin towards his. "You, and everyone."

Chi Chi blinked back tears, years of turmoil and fury rising to the surface again. None of it felt good.

She'd known this, in the back of her mind, but she only wanted to hear him _say_ it.

"I know."

Goku's hand brushed through her hair again, pushing it behind her ear in a soothing display of affection. It was endearing to her, how a man capable of destroying worlds could hold her this way, being gentle enough to repeatedly push strands of her hair along with his forefinger, as she embraced him in the dark.

She moved before thinking, sliding a leg over to the far side of his waist, and hooking herself over so that she straddled him before he could bother to protest.

Instead he grinned up at her, squeezing her ankles with a bruising force that she knew he couldn't comprehend, so she answered with a tight clench on his shoulders.

" _Easy._ " She told him tauntingly in a cautionary tone.

Goku chuckled. "I should be saying that to _you._ "

The thing she loved the most about her husband, was the teasing and threatening stance he could take on her in the dark like this, when she could inflect fury in her voice and tighten her knees at his sides with a grip that would make most feel uneasy, and he answered her with an excited stroke of his fingers up the backside of her calf while watching her intently as she straddled him.

The night didn't make her feel self conscious anymore, and she didn't have the blanket drawn to her chest.

"I need to know," Goku pressed, running his hand from her calf and giving her knee a squeeze as the opposite hand followed. "Do you _understand_ why I did it?"

Chi Chi opened her mouth, urged to say some sharp remark, but in the midst of Goku's gaze she decided against it, because she could tell it meant a lot to him, and she could tell he wasn't interested in a second round of physical intimacy tonight unless she could honestly produce an answer that he found satisfactory.

"You wanted to give me peace," Chi Chi spoke levelly, words freezing for a moment when his hand found her hip. "Because with you being alive there can be no peace."

His hand slid up her bare back, pulling her downward by the shoulder so that her forehead hovered over his, and the dark curtain of her loose hair was blocking what stray there was light was in the darkness around them.

"For me, or anyone." Chi Chi added, feeling him pull her by the cheek downward even further for a kiss.

She'd spoken the words with such clarity because she believed them; they were true in every sense of the definition.

She pulled back from him for a fraction of a second, allowing him the opportunity to respond, but the only response was the slight rise of his hips under hers and his lips finding hers in the dark again.

It was true, he'd done a selfless thing by leaving her alone, but she'd rather take Goku and the chaos and the loudmouth friends that he brought with him any day. And her time with him, and that with his sons, kept her afloat in the middle of chaos.

* * *

A/N: Was on the fence about writing this second part but decided to take a break from my other fic and it just made sense because I love this pairing! Will add a third eventually, thanks for reading!


	3. Chapter 3

The familiar smell of earth permeated his senses. It was funny, how being in one place or the other he'd always preferred the dry soil of Mt. Paozu; wetter in the winters and early spring, but dryer in any other time, making the wind harsh against his cheeks.

His sons had developed a similar preference, he could tell. Because though Goku hadn't grown up with Chi-Chi's presence and her cooking (which were more or less the same most times), she'd become like a part of the mountain herself. In a way, the mountain for more like her home than it was his; he'd lived and died only to live again, but she stayed nestled in their home where he lived his earliest memory, chasing their sons in a half-dressed fury in the summer heat and timid barefoot prints in the snow, where she sucked the air through her teeth so harshly his hairs would raise at the sound.

When they were first married he'd take her to the river in the woods and convert her; because she was a Princess and a tenacious human woman but _this_ is where he needed to have her.

It was home.

It was thoughts like this that plagued him in the hours the followed the Tournament of Power, because he dropped Gohan off at his house and lingered in the front yard for a moment, savoring the fluctuations in Gohan's ki when he was inside his home safely and happy, and Videl was awake with Pan to greet him.

Only then, did it hit him; why Gohan had been so upset when he first disclosed what the tournament was and what was truly at stake. Gohan was furious, berating him about it, and though it was admittedly silly that Goku had never actually considered what Gohan was fussing about- because his losses were the very things that were most important to him: Videl and Pan would fade away without a hint of what was happening to them for more than a moment erased the the multiverse's memory.

Goku frowned. _That_ would be awful.

He loved Videl perhaps as closely as he could to loving a daughter, and the thought of losing her and Pan, and Gohan and Goten, and Chi-Chi...

 _Ah._ That's why Gohan was so upset. The feeling of that thought _was_ pretty upsetting.

It'd all worked out- as he figuredit would, but in the instant that Gohan raised his daughter in his arms by the window and twirled her around the room, Goku brought his fingers to his temple in instant transmission, bringing him to Goten's bedroom.

It was formerly Gohan's room, and the floorboards creaked familiarly under his weight as he stalked to his youngest child's bed, where Goten rolled over but never stirred, and a peaceful glance of the child in cartoon printed pajamas made him warm on the inside.

Goku longed to push him awake, to rub the sleep from Goten's eyes with his thumb and urge him out of bed into elsewhere, jump with him into the river or fly with him high above the trees, where Goten would giggle and spiral with his little body, forcing Goku to catch him in the last second. He loved both his sons equally but he had to admit, Goten was definitely a lot of fun to be around.

He settled instead for a gentle lean and a soft kiss against Goten's cheek, glancing for a moment at the framed photograph of the two dressed up for Gohan's wedding hanging on the wall as he opened the bedroom door and slipped out into the hall.

Chi-Chi felt different than everyone else. Because she was scary at times but inviting and loved him with so intensity he couldn't comprehend. Of course he loved her too, because she was a part of the mountain he called home from the start of his memory.

And when she _was_ scary, well, he enjoyed it. Sometimes.

With all the gentleness he could muster he turned the door to their bedroom like he had countless times before, just before the lightning flashed in great shadows around their bedroom.

The commotion caused his wife to awaken, lifting her head in a dazed stare to the window and then back at him. She narrowed her eyes in the darkness.

"Goku?"

Her voice was weak and full of sleep. Had he been a wiser man he'd hush her and urge her to fall back asleep as he tip-toed to the bed.

But he wasn't feeling wise; he was _excited_ , though admittedly when he saw her roll over toward him in their bed like that, with her hair spilt all over the bedding because Chi-Chi was peaceful and safe, he felt a tinge of guilt, perhaps from the scolding that was to come when she inevitably found out what he'd been up to.

Through the years he'd longed so much to give her the life she wanted, but ultimately he couldn't. His life was a cycle of conflict and resolution, and the times he tried to stop it for her sake he couldn't.

He just couldn't help himself.

"Hey, Chi-Chi." He whispered with a smile. It felt good to say.

Her heavy lidded eyes fixated on him for a moment with pursed lips. She was appraising him, noting his disheveled appearance and the tattered state of his clothing that was evidence that his thirst for conflict was sated, at least for now.

"How was the tournament?" She asked, and he was grateful that she did because he'd been so focused on preparations that he couldn't remember for the life of him if she knew about it or not, though she'd have no way of knowing what he'd been bargaining with.

This was good. No need for a cover story.

"I thought you'd be back hours ago." Chi-Chi told him, pulling back the covers to his side for him the way she'd been doing lately; fully accustomed to his comings and goings.

He sat at the side of the bed beside her instead, his mind flitting rapidly the way it always did when he was restless like this. Too much had transpired for him to be content with falling asleep tonight, there was too much he wanted to do and see, but he wanted to keep her with him because he wasn't prepared for how seeing her asleep in his bed would make him feel.

He never slept as freely as he used to since he encountered Black, at least not at night. He'd heard some people talk about trauma and he never fully understood it, until he learned of Chi-Chi's murder with their child down the hall that was carried out with his own hands.

He didn't often think of conflict negatively, but the memory bothered him. Because he always did his best to make his hands gentle with her, whether with a squeeze of her shoulder or a cup of her chin when she was being stubborn, or when he dragged his palms up her bare back when she straddled him the way she liked to.

It wasn't right.

He'd been sitting over her in his thoughts, absentmindedly running a finger from her forehead to the bridge of her nose when she slapped her hand over his, making him stiffen in her clutch and snapping to attention beside him.

"What are you _doing?_ "

He chuckled and nervously tried to wriggle his hand from her grasp. "Nothing!"

"What were you thinking about just now?"

" _Nothing_!"

Her eyes narrowed. "You were thinking about nothing?"

She relinquished his hand. She had every right to be suspicious of his intentions, but he was home at a strange hour after being off the grid for several days.

Plus, her left breast was exposed from her spaghetti strapped nightgown in how it'd become strangely twisted about her, but he wasn't going to mention that right now.

"Actually, I was thinking of going somewhere tonight."

"You can't be serious, Goku I-"

"You're coming with me."

There were many places he'd yet to show her: like the green horizon of his home planet from distant memories, the leaves on the trees in autumn in the grove where Gohan used to play, and the billowing clouds that bordered Snake Way.

There were loads of memories he could show her, and it'd take him a lifetime of instant transmission to do.

They dissipated in a burst of light a reappeared on the border of a field of wild flowers, dark and wet from a humid summer night, but sheltered from the impending rainfall by a ceiling of elder trees.

" _What the hell, Goku!"_

Chi-Chi burst in a rancid scolding as her knee-bent posture from their previous location had sent her tumbling to the ground in their new one, pulling his cheek down to the her perch on the ground.

"Sorry, Chi-Chi-," He chuckled warmly, giving her his arm to steady herself with as she straitened out her night gown. "Didn't know the ground would be so rough."

"You didn't _know_?" She seethed at him, but in truth her anger but him at ease because of it's very existence.

She stood before him now, eyebrows furrowed and black hair hanging loose to her elbows whispering against him in a harsh breeze of everything he could've lost just hours ago.

She didn't stay mad at him for long, thank goodness, because it was a matter of seconds before her hand brought his chin downward towards her again, determined eyes drawing him in until a bolt of lightning flashed in the rain and a distant hiss of rain settled on the horizon.

In his younger years he would've found vindication in seduction; he would've kissed her so fully that she couldn't refuse him and he would've lowered her to the bed of grass and taken her right then and there until she pleaded with him.

Things were different now: the lightning in the sky and the smell of the damp earth reminded him of all the things he'd come so close to losing and Chi-Chi was looking at him with an inquisitive scowl.

"Take me back." Chi-Chi demanded, half exasperated, half begging.

But he didn't want to take her back home yet, he simply wanted to be with her here.

"I can't." He responded, knowing fully well that wouldn't be a suitable explanation.

" _Yes_ you _can Goku, I'm cold."_

He raised an eyebrow and wrapped an arm around her, pulling her to him in a gentle embrace and offering his usual unsatisfactory response:

"Stay close to me then."

She pulled her hands in fists to her collarbone under his hold, shrinking her silhouette in comparison to his.

She opened her mouth for a sharp comment when a booming roll of thunder clashed around them, and a gentle hiss of rain scattered atop the leaves of the canopy above them.

"Goku Son." Chi-Chi shook her head exasperatedly as he wrapped both his arms around her from behind, and lifted a finger to show her on the horizon the very sight that made him think of this place to begin with.

Her scolding fell silent when her eyes followed the top of his finger, and with his cheek pressed along the crown of her head where he could see the tips of her eyelashes flutter several times as he eyes focused in that direction.

It was past midnight, though the insects raged with noise but Chi-Chi didn't seem to care when he loosed his hold around her and she stepped forward with her bare feet in the dirt. The sky was a spectrum of gray and blue, like the dusky skies in fall. Lightning scattered across the sky, making it appear to be almost like daylight, but the rolls of thunder were silent as static electricity scattered across the sky in a bold, yet reverent storm.

"Pretty cool, huh?" He prodded.

Chi-Chi was still tense, her hands now collecting the knee length hem of her nightgown in fists.

"H-How did you know about this place?"

"It's always like this here when it rains."

She snapped her chin to her shoulder to eye him skeptically, meeting his eyes for the first time since he set foot in their room.

"You've been here before?"

He _knew_ she'd love it. The thing about Chi-Chi was that as much as she hated feeling dirty or pushed from her comfort zone, she was always ready to receive those things if he showed her something she could draw her romanticism from.

"I used to take Gohan here all the time when it was like this."

"Seriously?" Her tone told him she was a little disappointed to be left out, but then her demeanor softened.

"And Goten?"

"Not yet."

Thunder rolled again, louder this time, but the consistent flash of lighting bolt upon bolt in the sky was mesmerizing.

"We should go." Chi-Chi told him, but he could tell that she was reluctant to leave in the first place. She stepped forward towards the light several paces more, until the great roots of a tree hindered her from going much further before she'd be pelted with rain.

Moments passed, and when he heard no further protests from her he walked to join her on the root of the tree, savoring the moment until she'd determined that she'd had enough and insisted that he take her back.

It happened sooner than he would've liked, because the electrical phenomenon was exciting to him and he longed to go further out.

"I mean it, Goku." Chi-Chi turned to him, her arms crossed tightly about her chest again. "I'm starting to get wet. I'm wearing _white._ "

He wasn't sure why that was relevant by the way the dirt caked her feet, and the way that the humidity made her hair stick up, which he knew she hated.

But her arms shifted over her chest and it hit him.

 _'Oh.'_

"It's no big deal babe," He laughed at her, "I've seen you naked tons of times!"

She narrowed her eyes him. "Well you're not seeing me naked tonight, so get that stupid grin off your face. Take me back."

He offered her his arm, like he had so many times before.

* * *

"Did you know," she told him, later that night when her feet were clean and he'd showered to her satisfaction before pulling back the covers in their bed to lay down next to her, "That for my whole life since we met, I'd dreamed of you Goku."

It was just her way to talk like this whenever she was feeling sentimental and she was content. And like a sixth sense she'd known he'd been up to something the past several days and that it had blown over like it always did.

A smile crept across his lips as he reached for her to pull her back against him; she was happy, at least.

"What kind of dreams?" He spoke into her hair, "Dirty ones?"

Chi-Chi snorted. " _No._ Why, do _you_ have dirty dreams Goku?"

"No." He was assertive, but it was a lie.

She continued, brushing off his teasing. "I dreamed you here, Goku. And I dreamed Gohan and Goten, and Videl and Pan. Whenever you were gone- or dead, I'd dream of you all. And you all came to me."

Goku listened, unsure of what she was trying to say. Sometimes, in very serious conversations she spoke in riddles, and it could get frustrating when he wasn't sure what she was trying to say.

"Goku, I know this hasn't been any tournament." She admitted at last. He stiffened. How did she know? Did she even know? She was acting awfully calm if she did.

She didn't know, but she was suspicious, he concluded.

"Chi-Chi..." He frowned down at her, not knowing what to say when she turned onto her back to look up at him, a womanly echo of how he'd find her looking at him in the mornings when they were first married.

She silenced him with a small finger to his lips, and he was grateful to be relieved of the burden of talking, but when her eyes snapped to his with an untold sternness in her expression.

"There are people who want to take my dreams away from me, Goku. Because of things you have, or haven't done. And that's the way it'll always be."

He thought of Black again and stiffened. Cell. Buu. Frieza. Even Zenny.

"I need you to stop them, Goku. Don't let anyone take my dreams."

So _this_ was what it was all about.

He looked at her for a moment, unsure of how to proceed. As a husband and a man, he'd made many errors by her, but this was _maybe_ something he could get right.

With one arm propped under his head on the pillow, he pulled the other one to her hand, eyes locking with hers: analytical and focused, as if they were partners in a sparring match.

He freed his mouth of her single finger, pushing it gently away by her wrist.

"I won't." He told her, and he lowered himself to her lips, giving her every opportunity to push him back the way she sometimes did when she was upset. She didn't, and reciprocated his kiss wholeheartedly instead, with her fingers sliding through his hair.

"I won't." He repeated, murmuring against her.


End file.
